The official website of Bremgarten, a picturesque Swiss town of 6,430 residents located about 20 km (12 miles) from Zurich, bids visitors “a hearty welcome” and boasts of the “wide range of sports and leisure facilities” available in the community. But for two dozen new arrivals — and 130 more expected in the future — the town’s hospitality and its recreational options remain untested.

That’s because local authorities have announced last week that asylum seekers housed by the federal government in Bremgarten’s army barracks won’t be allowed to move around town freely or use the local swimming pool and other sports facilities. “For security reasons, we decided not to allow access to these areas,” the town’s mayor, Raymond Tellenbach, explained in a TV interview. He did not specify what sanctions, if any, would be imposed on those breaking the rule.

And Mario Gattiker, head of the Federal Office for Migration, told the Tages Anzeiger newspaper last week that the restrictions are meant to “prevent a situation where 50 asylum seekers all want to use a football pitch or the pool at once, which could lead to friction and resentment” from the locals.

Bremgarten’s decision has quickly drawn criticism from human-rights groups and incited accusations of racism, since the refugee center’s residents come from Africa and Asia. The announcement coincided with the news that an exclusive Zurich boutique refused to sell American media mogul Oprah Winfrey an expensive handbag last month, ostensibly because she is black — the store’s owner has denied that the incident was racist, calling it a “misunderstanding caused by the language barrier.” (Even though Switzerland’s tourist body apologized to Winfrey, Swiss animal-rights group Vier Pfoten, or Four Paws, criticized her for wanting to buy a $35,000 crocodile bag, saying she should have been aware of cruel methods used to obtain the skins of exotic animals.)

Also recently, local media reported that the country’s recruitment agencies are refusing to find jobs for French workers because Swiss employers consider them to be “lazy and arrogant.” Although the three events are unrelated, they deepen a growing international perception of Switzerland as a country where racial profiling and discrimination have become increasingly rampant.

But Swiss Justice Minister Simonetta Sommaruga, whose department oversees migration, told reporters soon after the Bremgarten imbroglio that asylum seekers would not be prevented from using public facilities. “The basic rights, including the freedom of movement, are guaranteed for everybody,” she added.

That may be, but the issue of asylum and plans to open more refugee centers — mostly in small towns and villages — remain contentious. (The federal government has the right to use the premises it owns across the country to house asylum seekers, without asking the permission of the local authorities.) Roman Staub, the mayor of Menzingen, a town of 4,300 inhabitants that will house between 100 and 200 asylum seekers in 2015, echoed the unease expressed by his Bremgarten counterpart, telling a Swiss TV station on Aug. 6 that asylum seekers in his community would not be allowed to enter “sensitive areas” like schoolyards to prevent contact with children. Bremgarten is hardly the first town to come down hard on the refugees. Alex Sutter, co-director of humanrights.ch, a Swiss human-rights group, says that the practice of barring asylum seekers from certain public spaces is common, “but, until now, nobody has noticed or cared about it.”

There is no specific reason why the Bremgarten ban made the news when others didn’t, but the country has experienced a recent spike in the asylum requests, mostly due to the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings; nearly 50,000 people have sought asylum in 2012, the highest number since the refugee influx during the 1999 Balkans war. And in June of this year, the Swiss voted in favor of a stricter asylum law that includes measures such as the exclusion of ex-soldiers who apply for asylum as military defectors — a measure interpreted as a bid to block many Eritreans fleeing forced enlistment in their own country (Eritreans comprised a considerable proportion of Switzerland’s asylum seekers last year).

For all the talk about xenophobia, however, Switzerland has had a generous asylum policy, in line with its humanitarian traditions, which include hosting the U.N. refugee agency as well as the International Red Cross. And while 50,000 refugees may not seem like a high number, Switzerland is a small country of only 8 million people. According to government figures, the nation has one asylum seeker for 332 inhabitants, a higher rate than the European average of one asylum seeker for every 625 residents.

If the issue continues to stir controversy, it is due in large part to the rhetoric of the far-right Swiss People’s Party (SVP), which has long insisted that the majority of asylum seekers are not “real” refugees escaping persecution in their home countries, but rather regular immigrants who want to go to Switzerland for economic reasons. These “false” refugees, SVP says on its website, live off generous welfare benefits while turning to life of crime and drug dealing.

At least some of these claims are based on facts. Police records show that asylum seekers are responsible for many of the cases of theft, burglaries, sexual assaults and other infractions committed in their host communities. These statistics have fueled SVP’s antiasylum stance, which has trickled down to the public, sparking fears about safety in places that house refugee centers. (Switzerland still has one of the world’s lowest crime rates.) In recent years, the party has used Switzerland’s system of direct democracy, which allows citizens to draft new laws and force nationwide referendums on legislation such as the ban on building new mosque minarets and the mandated deportation of foreigners who commit violent crimes in Switzerland (both initiatives were affirmed by voters).

Still, human-rights activist Sutter denies that the Swiss are racist or hostile — certainly not more so than other countries dealing with the influx of refugees. “The ban forbidding asylum seekers access to certain areas will be lifted as soon as a court declares that it violates the constitutional right to move freely,” he predicts. In the meantime, though, the residents of Bremgarten’s asylum center may well have to stay out of the town’s public pool — or they could find themselves swimming against the tide.

I wish the United States would adopt immigration laws like the Swiss have. We'd be a whole lot safer than we are now. There is nothing like having these feral apes running in the streets committing crimes on a daily basis.

If i was swiss i wouldn't want negro's adn kweers in my country..hell i dont want them in USA but the jewsnews, which control the media, continues to push them down our throat..but most of us know kweers and negros are not the best people to have in you contry

Screw this. It's enough that these European countries take refugees at all while wealthy Asian nations like Japan take almost no one and don't get called on it! Those African and Asian refugees can find asylum in safer Asian or African countries. Oh they can't? They'll be discriminated against? Then stop coming down on the people who at least actually accept refugees!

Absolute NONSENSE ... back in the early 70's when I lived in Geneva. Half of the Swiss women there had children by their Sub-Sahara African mates. Currently, Germany has the highest number of "African" immigrants compared to other foreign minority groups. BTW, for decades scores of wealthy Americans have maintained secret accounts in SWISS BANKS, namely in Zurich/Geneva. Vastly, enriched by BILLIONS of $$$$$ worth of stolen NAZI LOOT = BLOOD MONEY!

As a swiss person living in Lausanne (french part, near Geneva) I can tell you that things are not so simple as this article depicts. The Swiss are globally sick of rising crime rates and insecurity because 99% of the problem is imported. That being said, most of the house burglaries are commited by French crews comming from Marseille. Not African refugees and we know that.

Furthermore, it's true that they are not at all real refugees, most of these guys are in essence "economic refugees" with no jobs or prospects in their country. They end up either rotting in the state system with just enough money to eat and have a roof but do nothing all day, or the alternative is to sell coke, in Lausanne, you can find coke faster than Aspirin.

As for rapes, I don't know what they are talking about, that would have been all over the news here if one of these refugees had been caught raping someone, don't recall that ever happening. Most rapes are date rapes from what I recall of the statistics.

To be honest, Americans are a bigger problem to Switzerland with the way they bully the governement of Switzerland on the banking issue.

@thomaserossi: What the Bolsheviks did was not called racism, or they didn't call it racism. America too the term "racism" and put a face on it. They gave it roots, watered it, and allowed it to grow. Unfortunately, America start a lot of trends around the world, good and bad, and therefore the term "racism" has become a modern day term. Racism is one export USA can keep. The whole country thrives on it. It's constantly a dilemma.

One will never see hypocritical Time magazine call Israel xenophobic, a country that ethnically cleanses the indigenous Palestinian people and engages in pogroms against African immigrants. The Swiss have the same right as any other country to set their own immigration policy and to preserve their culture and identity, Time magazine's racist double standards notwithstanding.

If a previously tolerant people all of a sudden embrace xenophobia, then the culture has already changed , and what is attempting to be preserved is no more. The Swiss have their own sovereign nation, they can allow or disallow any immigration they want. But if they're going to do it in the name of preserving their culture, then they may need to look into deporting all their young men who have swastika tattoos out of their country as well. That is a German import. Or they can just proclaim that Switzerland is a white nation with a white culture which will remain so, and then commit the necessary human rights violations that may be necessary - limiting the number of children immigrants can have, limiting the practice of their religion, harsher penalties for immigrant crimes, etc. If that's not palatable, the immigrants already in Switzerland can go either way - slowly integrate like the Irish in America, or be a perpetual underclass like the blacks. It's the Swiss' choice.

As far as immigrant criminality goes - this is a misunderstanding of the nature of immigration. People who are doing well in their own countries do not leave - it would be nice for the Swiss if all their immigrants were doctors, rocket scientists and nuclear physicists, but they are not. The Swiss can not take in another country's poorest people and complain that they act as poor people tend to do - live on welfare, commit crimes, be angry about their wretched state, and pass it along to their children - and then attribute their actions to the whole of their race or culture. That might just be the definition of racism. Racism is a problem of the people who hold those beliefs, not the ones who they hold them against.

As far as racism being an American import in Switzerland - Europe has its own rich tradition of home grown racism long before the term was coined. Europeans have been executing pogroms for centuries because blaming societal ills on easily identifiable minorities is a common societal impulse. One can not claim to be above racism and then claim one has no choice but to embrace it because these foreigners are so criminal. In fact, it could be argued that American racism is imported from Europe, since the origins of American culture lie in Europe, and it was their European attitudes about race that allowed the first pilgrims to purchase the first black slaves in America.

@DeeDeeDenise America started in 1776 as a Western culture of rational individualism, mixed, by historical accident, with the slavery of religious conservative culture. Racism is the religious conservative rationalization of slavery needed to oppose the culture of rational individualism.

@DeeDeeDeniseWrong. Leon Trotsky invented the word "racism" to shame, guilt, and malign Europeans into silence. You're hung up on this idea that all things are American. They're not. Plenty of imports have been popularized and turned into American things. The word "racism" is one of them. It came into the English language by way of French Communists, but it was coined by Leon Trotsky.

Check your Oxford English Dictionary for the etymology of the word "racism."

@thomaserossi Israel is not without its racism. That is a knock on their democracy, and probably aggravates a lot of their problems with the Palestinians.

A white, Christian, western nation can take the steps necessary to keep itself that way, but it can not then be a democracy. The governments of those nations can either have the power to select who is white, Christian and western enough to come in and stay, or they can not. If they ban immigration all together, none of those countries have the birthrates to sustain their nations and support their generous welfare systems.

Also, I hope you're not including the United States among those white, Christian, western nations - it is not that western anymore and its people worship money, not Christ.

@yangcenit@BarryButtBoy Well I do know that 1700's Alabamians also knew the criminal nature of these dark things and probably would have picked their own cotton had they known they were going to unleash the animals out into the wilds of America.

@sonsofaureus - Go preach your Pulpit of Cultural Marxism to Japan (99% racial and ethnic Japanese) or China! Oh but you can't! You're not anti-racist, you're anti-white. Your programming prevents you from getting preachy with the Japanese or Chinese. You're like Pavlov's Dog slobbering endlessly as the bell rings.

@sonsofaureus@DeeDeeDenise America made it "fashionable" how's that? America is as far away from the European outlook as Black Americans are from Africa. An "Italian America" is nothing compared to a "real Italian," for instance. America is the "poster child" of modern day racism. Everything in your culture relates to racism. Race is compared in eating habits. dress, how people drive, who gets shot the most, diseases, music. Especially between blacks and whites. America keeps the "racism" machine going quite well...America is a very immature culture and whenever you travel you bring your lack of "open-mindedness" with you.

@thomaserossi@DeeDeeDenise Well let's put it this way...America "modernized" racism. And no, I don't believe "all things are American" by far. I have lived outside the country long enough to know better. In fact, many inventions are not American at all but America capitalized on them. Leon Trotsky coined the term "racism" in print from my understanding. America has made the word a common modern day aphorism. In no other country is the term used like in America to identify with everyday life such as determining the differences in learning behaviors and eating habits. In America, everything comes down to race. It's the most racist country on the planet...IMHO

@DidaNdi - You deny that human beings can BE savage and illiterate as they chop the heads off of children, mutilate genitals, suicide bomb soccer games, restaurants, and public transportation? So you think with that kind of hatred and contempt for the civilized world you are anything BUT a savage? No civilized nation needs you and they're all better off without you. Stay in the 3rd World cesspool of your own making. Saying you're a "refugee" is a lie. You're part of the problem, not a "refugee."

@sonsofaureus@DeeDeeDenise America is a cesspool! Europe is much older than America and wiser too! Switzerland has more immigrants than any other country in Europe per capita... it's just that the Swiss don't allow anchor babies and immigrants to come into the country to live off of welfare at the expense of "legal" citizens. By the way...I am a dual citizen so I am an American citizen as well. I know all about America and its "love affair" with racism. Stick a fork in this...it's done!

@DeeDeeDenise@sonsofaureus hahaha take it from a citizen of the country that made racism fashionable, and whose laws and litigious nature requires constant thought of its citizens about racial sensitivity - what is described in the article above is racism. I wouldn't say America thrives on its institutional racism - it is a tremendous waste of human capital - if we're thriving, it's in spite of our racism not because of.

I would disagree that Italian America is nothing compared to any other group of people, Italians in Italy included. I would also insist that your limited contact with Americans who happen to visit your country ill-qualifies you to evaluate our open-mindedness or the maturity of our culture. You can think America made racism fashionable, but you have to find it suits you to adopt it, like you just did about Italians in America or Americans in general.

Race is an issue in our country because our country is multi-racial and multi-cultural in a way no other nation is. We will see how Swiss "open-mindedness" deals with the changes in the racial make up of your country. It will be the previously uni-racial nations that have the most trouble, whether it be the Europeans or the Asians, maturity of their cultures notwithstanding.

@SallyLane - When people are ugly, anti-white racists I don't need to see anything else. In fact, I don't want to be around them at all. You're an anti-white racist and I don't have to know anything else. All I have to know is these our white, European countries with a Christian, not Jewish, Muslim or Atheist heritage. We don't have to ever explain ourselves to you. If you don't like us we have the right to make you leave under pain of death.

@DeeDeeDenise@YazminRobles Liar, I read everything and you were hostile from the beginning. And apparently you have problems reading English because you don't understand anything. She never claimed to know everything there is to know about the country, and she explained the issue about the guy with the dental problem, and it doesn't sound like she's lying about anything. You just see what you want to see and since you are an ugly person you only see ugliness even when she was nice and praised the country.

@YazminRobles You started the whole milieu by trying to claim that by being a "visitor" to Switzerland you knew everything there is to know about the country. And by mentioning the guy with the "dental problem" you were trying to insinuate that Switzerland does not help the people who live there. "I" as a citizen wanted to "straighten you out" with your misconceptions. Anyways I didn't get to read all of your post it was too long!...LOL Anyways Good Luck with your life!

@DeeDeeDenise@thomaserossiIn regard to the story about the guy with the dental problems, I know there’s assistance, but as you know, you must qualify. My friend for example does not qualify, so he travels to another country (not a TWC by the way) to get dental care, because he can go on vacation and get dental care for the price that he would pay for dental care alone in Switzerland. I’m not making up anything, sorry. And I brought up the story because it was my first experience with someone xenophobic from Switzerland; the people he was talking about was people from a country that my friend and I had lived in, so we knew the country and this guy was going on and on saying things like “I’m sure those people live like…blah, blah, blah” “I’m sure those people dress like…blah, blah, blah”, etc., so he was talking without knowing (as you do about me), displaying a superior kind of attitude when there was so much left to be desired from him as a Swiss citizen; the way he spoke was more like what some people call a hillbilly or white trash; my friend was very ashamed of his display of ignorance and xenophobia. You say that Swiss people are relaxed, mature, and reserved (I agree mostly with the last two), but the way you express yourself with hostility, doubt and insults does not show any of this, so on this matter, you don’t seem to represent the Swiss people very well, and ONLY on this matter, I might be more Swiss than you, and say… more diplomatic.

But anyways, if you despise so much all foreigners –including tourists too like us, who should stay home according to you- then why bother so much with the posts to protect the good image of Switzerland? Swiss people know the truth, so they don’t need any clarification, which means that you’re writing mostly to the foreign people. So why do you need to work so hard with these posts to clarify things to foreign people and let them know how wonderful Switzerland is, if you don’t want them there anyway!!? There’s a contradiction here! Let them think that Switzerland is all racist, xenophobic and horrible so that they will not want to go there! If they are all wrong, and you don’t want more foreign people, let them think whatever. You’re working against yourself saying how attractive Switzerland is!

As for myself, I make a pretty good living as a highly educated professional and I own several properties where I live, so we’re not in a rush of going anywhere else (and we don’t need to), and have no plans to live there or anywhere else in the near future, so don’t worry, we won’t be two more foreigners invading your country; we’ll just keep on visiting every once in a while. But, IF we EVER WANTED TO live there, your hatred nor the attitudes of the people with the despise expressions could change our minds or keep us away (only cigarettes would); those people deserve our pity. As for you, I can assure you that the hostility that you display is not for good for your physical or mental health, so since you like giving advice, and I am a caring person, forgive me if I advice you to seek help and deal with your anger and frustration. It’s for own good. As for now, I have things way more significant in my life to pay attention to, so I don’t think I’ll be coming back to this post.

@DeeDeeDenise@thomaserossiDear Denisse: It’s funny that you say here that you believe
there’s only one race, the human race, which I totally agree with, yet when
someone complained -because of his experience- that minorities and foreigners
are treated as inferiors in Switzerland, you said “And they should be [treated
as inferiors]”, which I don’t agree with at all. Of course, race and foreigners
are two different things, but something here doesn't seem to fit because you’re
advocating for something that racist people do, but based on whether they’re
Swiss or not instead of the race.

In response to your last post to me, it is very democratic
of you to imply that I shouldn't have made that post, and to expect people to
keep their mouths shut. You are very free to piss on the US and other countries
but no one should say anything about Switzerland, even when the comments
represent the experiences of those people. Very democratic indeed! Also, there seems to
be a communication problem along with other things. Nobody here is questioning
your citizenship or your knowledge of the Swiss culture (at least I am not) nor
have I claimed to know more of Switzerland than you or have claimed to know what
it is to live in Switzerland, although I might know more than you would like me
to. My friend and I talk on a regular basis and discuss a variety of issues from
Switzerland such as the high suicide rate; a Swiss guy I knew, friend of my
friend, killed himself years ago, but fortunately the suicide rate has gone
down since the Reform. We talk pretty much about everything, banking, investments,
housing issues and many others. So although I certainly will never know as much
as you about Switzerland, I know more than you want me to apparently, I don’t
understand why that bothers you so much or is threatening to you.

Also, it’s sad to see that you only seem to focus on the
negative things and resource to a hostile attitude and insults. I don’t need to
“claim” anything, as I don’t need to doubt your word when say you have been to
over 20 countries (that’s one thing we have in common, although I’m sure you
will not believe it, it’s just a lie or a “claim”, right?). By the way, you are wrong to assume that
because I write in English and read Time magazine, I live in the States. Wrong!
Again, assuming and saying things you don’t know anything about. So you can
send your advice and insults somewhere else. And I must say that your
statement “you seem very inexperienced to various cultures” doesn't make any
sense or have any grounds. My comments have been related to the Swiss culture,
so I don’t know what various cultures you’re talking about. By the way, you do the same mistake that US people do when they call the US "America"; America includes all the countries in the Americas, not just the US.

I completely agree that vacationing and living are two different
things. But I expressed my disappointment on two things for which I don’t need to
live there to have experienced and my statement that “it would a wonderful place
to live” was related to the two of us specifically, not for the Swiss people or
the rest of the world as you have interpreted. We never noticed the heavy
smoking before –as cigarettes didn't bother us as much in the past-, but right
now it is a deal breaker, meaning that even though we love country, we wouldn't live there because we can’t stand the heavy smoking. So it’s not an option. The
other thing I mentioned that was disappointing was the staring at foreigners
with expressions of disgust because as an advanced society, the standards
should be higher and we expect more; it’s sad to still see some Swiss people displaying
ignorant, immature and backward attitudes; it was seen on several occasions
during the little time we were there, and when something is repeated, there
seems to be a pattern, although they’re not the majority of the Swiss people
and we met a lot of nice Swiss people.

As I said before, I understand the despise toward foreigners
who commit crimes, that is totally logical; I myself was about to be robbed in
Lausanne by someone who was obviously a foreigner (he was very obvious too about
his intentions and even tried to follow us) and people who commit crimes
shouldn't be allowed to stay in the country. And my friend has been a victim; a
foreigner destroyed my friend’s belongings, and threaten to harm him, but the
police told my friend there was no law or anything they could do to keep this
person away from him, since there was no physical injury and there were no
witnesses. The police didn't do anything. This foreigner has been in
Switzerland for too many years without holding a steady job nor learning the language,
he’s brought only trouble to my friend and the country (he was even in the news
once) but he’s still in the country! Why? These people should not be allowed to
be there, but to assume that anyone who is not Swiss is there to cause harm is
mistaken, and to look at them with despise talks poorly of them. This has
nothing to do with being “politically correct” or any morality. It’s just
mistaken, it’s a wrong assumption. I agree that you must protect your country
(and please do!), but what these people show, beyond xenophobia, ignorance or
prejudice, is a lack of resources to deal with their impotence and frustration with
their our country for not keeping away these criminals effectively.

@thomaserossi@DeeDeeDeniseBritiians do not consider themselves Europeans believe me. I have been to over 20 different countries and I know for a "fact" when people think of racism America is the first country to come to mind. I don't know what world you live in but "today" when someone thinks of racism they think of the US not Leon Trotsky! It doesn't mean that other countries don't suffer from the same disease. It's funny, you believe that America didn't recognize racism until the 60s, after so many years of slavery? We can agree to disagree...In my eye there is only one race the "human race."

@DeeDeeDenise - If you think that "America has made the word a common modern day aphorism" you're wrong. Europeans and Brits (who now can't tell themselves apart from Europe) have been using the word "racism" to guilt whites for 80 years. America didn't start screaming racism until the 60's.

@thomaserossi@sonsofaureus The world is overpopulated, just not with Western Europeans. That is a real trend. The birthrate for Switzerland is 1.42 births/woman, meaning the Swiss are not replacing themselves fast enough (you need to be above 2 to be a growing population). A population on numerical decline with increasing life spans means more and more retired people being supported by fewer and fewer younger people. The world birthrate is 2.55, so the world population is growing - Africa's high birthrates making up the difference for the low European birthrates.

@thomaserossi@Barton You don't know me from Adam. You don't know that I am a veteran who fought to keep you free and give you the right to express your opinion on this forum - even if I don't agree with it. You obviously need to have the last word, so be it.

1. The headline is still a lie. Of course, you're lying too which brings us to the next point where you began... "Journalists REPORT the events, not create them." Really? So what "event" is the morality of a nation? That is not an "event" that is an ethos.

2. There is no balance whatsoever in any article that moralizes. What right does any journalist have to question the sovereignty or ethics of any nation? This is seen in blaming the "rhetoric" of "right-wingers", something Time Magazine does with stale regularity. This is indoctrination. You missed this completely because you're completely indoctrinated.

3. You started with the insults. You're the one who postured. Now your anger is directed at anyone who dares to stand up to you. I'm not in your so-called classroom. You don't get to threaten me with a failed grade.

4. You're still playing pop-psychologist, just like journalists everywhere. Anyone who disagrees with your Cult is "angry", "ignorant" and "wallows". No doubt you taught your students the Litany of Agitprop.

2. If you read the whole article you'll see that it says..."Switzerland has had a generous asylum policy." It then goes to quote a Swiss human rights expert who states that the Swiss are not racist. The fact that all of this was included in the article means the reporter did her job of writing a balanced story.

3. As for your insults directed at me...I have no intention of going down to your level and responding. If you want to wallow in your mis-directed anger and ignorance, that's your business.

Somehow a country that takes in 3rd world "asylum seekers" is also "xenophobic." What "xenophobia" exists? How is it that an entire country is branded with a psychological disorder by a so-called journalist and somehow you, a doctrinaire university teacher, is unable to read a headline? Oh that's right! The so-called journalist you're defending is also moralizing pop-psychologist. Maybe this is why...

"You may or may not agree with the whole issue but to take your anger out on the writer, that's really low."

That sounds familiar eh? You're ALSO a pop-psychologist; as well as a moralizing, preaching one-time journalism teacher at a university.So yeah, you are indoctrinated.

@thomaserossi@Barton Where are the lies in this article? The writer has not made up anything, everything is attributed to sources. You may or may not agree with the whole issue but to take your anger out on the writer, that's really low.

And no, I am not indoctrinated. I taught journalism courses at a university for many years, so I know what I am talking about.